


my tears ricochet

by griffenly



Category: The 100 (TV)
Genre: Angst, Angst and Hurt/Comfort, Angst with a Happy Ending, Break Up, Breaking Up & Making Up, F/M, Post-Break Up, it's like you're gonna suffer but you're gonna be happy about it
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-08-07
Updated: 2020-08-07
Packaged: 2021-03-06 06:07:32
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 4,925
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/25768660
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/griffenly/pseuds/griffenly
Summary: In the end, she had known it would be his eyes that would haunt her the most.
Relationships: Bellamy Blake/Clarke Griffin
Comments: 15
Kudos: 121





	my tears ricochet

**Author's Note:**

> It's just really cool of Miss Taylor Swift herself to write an entire album about Bellarke, huh?? Song recs and inspiration include, but are not limited to: my tears ricochet; exile; peace.
> 
> All my love, friends.

When Clarke sees him again, turning away from the pick-up counter at the coffee shop on the corner, she feels the force of a hurricane slam into her body.

He goes to take a sip – black, two sugars, _of course she would remember_ – when their eyes meet. He freezes in motion, mouth slightly agape, and she can’t help but wonder how absurd they must look to the wandering eyes surrounding them. She barely breathes and hates the way her heart stutters in her chest, the way her fingers are itching to wrap around his bicep and curl into his hair. The last six months have felt like an entire lifetime; she feels like she has aged years instead of weeks.

She only breaks contact when someone smacks into her from behind.

“The doorway is a pretty shit spot to wait,” a gruff voice informs her, and she sputters out an apology, shifting to the right so the man can enter. She takes this as her opening, her sign from the universe, and dodges around the stranger and out the front door without even glancing back.

As she near-sprints down the street, she swears she hears him calling her name, the syllables drowning in the New York City traffic. She clenches her fists to stop them from shaking and inhales several soothing breaths to steady her blood pressure. But the images are still there; papering the backs of her lids like the Polaroids she’d taped up in her dorm room. Those eyes, warm and honest and vulnerable, look the exact same as she remembered.

In the end, she had known it would be his eyes that would haunt her the most.

* * *

Clarke has had to tell the story of she and Bellamy a million times, it seems.

She had always been a sucker for a tragedy. It serves her right.

It began: Halloween, junior year. All around her were girls wearing black outfits with a pair of animal ears on their head for good measure, guys dressed in their favorite basketball jersey or Hawaiian shirt and calling it a costume. She came straight from the library, still wearing her jeans and beat-up Converse, eyes roaming the crowded fraternity house for any sign of Raven. She’d had another fight with Wick, apparently, and needed a ride home.

Keeping her arms crossed over her chest, Clarke meandered through the throngs of people, artfully dodging the swaying red plastic cups and the roving hands of drunken boys. Her sobriety felt even more heightened surrounded by her peers in this state, and she cursed her short stature when she couldn’t find Raven or Wick anywhere. Letting out a frustrated huff, she decided to try and search outside.

As she spun around rapidly, her body fully collided with another, spilling beer all over her chest.

“Ah, _fuck_ , I’m so sorry,” the stranger stammered, abandoning his plastic cup and seemingly surveying the damage. “Let me –”

“No, no, it’s fine,” Clarke assured, sighing quietly. “I’m just trying to find my friend and get out of here.” She started to leave when his hand caught around her wrist.

It was the tenderness of it that stopped her.

She turned around slowly, letting her eyes travel up to his face. Even in the dimness of the house, she could make out hundreds of freckles dotting his cheeks and chin and nose. His eyes were a molten brown and they watched her with an intensity and openness that made her both nervous and, somehow, at peace. His lips twitched, curling at the corners, and she swallowed thickly.

“Let me at least get you a clean shirt,” he offered, nodding his head towards the bedrooms upstairs. “You’ll be miserable if you stay in that one.”

Clarke must have looked uneasy, because he squeezed her wrist gently. “Completely honorable intentions, I assure you,” he said teasingly. “Besides, you definitely can’t drive anyone home reeking of booze.”

She rolled her eyes, irritated that he was right, but couldn’t help the smile that spread over her face. He grinned back, and before she could say anything else, he deftly moved his hand into her own and interlocked their fingers. Tugging her forward, he carved a path through the crowd. As he led her up the rickety stairs, the thunderous noise below began to dull, until she could just feel the faint thumping of the speaker’s bass beneath her feet.

When he opened the door to his room and ushered her inside, she was taken aback by the cleanliness of it. The bed was in one corner, made and covered in a pale blue, striped comforter; there was a desk directly to her right as she entered, and it had just his computer and some black pens sitting in a plastic cup. In the unoccupied corner, there was a tall bookshelf, stacked to the brim with thick volumes. As he shuffled around the closet searching for a t-shirt, her finger grazed the titles.

“History buff, huh?” she asked lightly.

Her companion laughed, and turned around bearing a black _Ark U_ shirt. “That _is_ my major, so yes,” he replied. He handed the shirt to her with two hands, pointing towards a door directly across from them. “Bathroom’s in there if you want to change.”

Clarke watched him suspiciously. He was endearing, if she was being honest, and carried himself with a kind of fearlessness that scared her a little. She had known someone like that once, too; someone she had believed would build fires to keep her warm, and yet turned around and set Clarke’s heart aflame, instead.

She turned away from him and went into the bathroom, locking the door behind her. Slipping out of her beer-stained shirt, she grimaced slightly at the stickiness she could already feel layering her skin. Using the hand towel she found neatly folded next to the sink, she wiped her arms and chest down before tugging on the stranger’s t-shirt. It looked like it was swallowing her, and she couldn’t deny that she didn’t hate the way it made her feel.

She folded her own messy, plaid button-up and exited the bathroom, offering the stranger a nod in gratitude. “Thanks,” she said quietly.

He rolled back and forth on his heels with his hands shoved in his pockets. “Yeah, of course, any time,” he stuttered out, and Clarke found herself smiling again. _Endearing._

They stood in a strange silence for a few heartbeats: Clarke clutching her ruined shirt in her arms, the stranger staring at a fascinating wooden plank in the floorboards. Anticipation thrummed beneath her skin, although she had no earthly idea what she was hoping would happen next.

“Well,” she murmured finally. He raised his eyes to meet hers. “I should really find my friend.”

Nodding quickly, the boy stuck his hand out, grinning at her once more. “I’m Bellamy, by the way.”

She reached out a tentative hand of her own. “Clarke. It… it was nice to meet you.”

In the middle of his bedroom, they held outstretched hands like that for several seconds. Clarke finally let hers drop, lips twitching. She could feel him watching her, and it sent a fluttering sensation through her stomach.

As if he could see right through her, Bellamy smirked. “You can bring that shirt back whenever, by the way.”

Clarke laughed lightly. “Ah, so not really a _gift,_ I see.”

“No,” Bellamy replied. His voice turned more serious, eyes boring into hers with hunger. “More like an excuse to see you again.”

And he did. For nine years.

* * *

Helplessly, Bellamy watches her dip out of the coffee shop, sprinting up the street as though she has just seen a ghost.

He stumbles out the door behind her and calls her name, nearly spilling his coffee all over the place. Right outside of the door, his eyes follow her blonde head as it bobs through the throngs of pedestrians on the city sidewalk. And then she disappears, slipping onto a side street, and he loses her for the second time.

Ignoring the way his hand shakes as he pushes it through his hair, he absently wonders if she noticed that it’s gotten longer, if she liked it. He wonders, too, why he still cares.

As he closes his eyes for the briefest of moments, he pictures the moment again. She is just as beautiful as he remembers, her eyes the bluest things in the entire world. Wishfully, he thinks they look a bit less haunted, a bit more centered, than that night six months ago. There are a million things he wants to say to her, had wanted to say to her the moment their gazes met.

If he is given the chance, he will start with: _I’m sorry._ And then: _You were right._ And then: _Can we try again?_

If he is brave, he will say: _I love you._

His coffee already feels cold in his hand, and he tosses it into the trashcan beside him listlessly. He has meetings to get to, a presentation to manage. It takes every ounce of his strength to keep himself from running in the direction he had seen her travel.

In the aftermath, it was Octavia who had said, “You will spend your entire life chasing Clarke Griffin.”

He tastes iron on his tongue.

* * *

Bellamy has relived their final fight a million times, it seems.

He knows, better than anyone, that you cannot rewrite the past. He tries and tries and tries, anyway.

They met up with their friends for drinks that night to celebrate Emori and Murphy’s engagement – “About fucking time,” Bellamy had said to him as he’d clapped him on the back. Raven brought her new boyfriend, Shaw, and Octavia had even stopped by for a little while, giving them a few smiles and offering her congratulations before slipping back home. It had been nearly a year since Lincoln’s death, and there were still ghosts swimming in her eyes, most days. Tonight, though, there was the slightest glimpse of the old her.

“O looked better, don’t you think?” Clarke asked as they stumbled into the apartment. She tossed her keys into the bowl sitting on her counter, shrugging off her jacket and letting it fall lazily to the floor. Bellamy rolled his eyes and bent over to pick it up before hanging it on the hooks he had installed right next to the door.

“She did,” he agreed as Clarke pulled off her booties. Concern tingeing his voice, he added, “She still looks too thin.”

She met his eyes with a soft, knowing smile and sidled up to him. Wrapping her arms around his waist, face pressed into his chest, she murmured, “Let’s go over there and make dinner with her tomorrow.”

Bellamy kissed the top of her head and held her tightly. They had been together for so long, he shouldn’t have been surprised that Clarke knew exactly what he needed in any circumstance; even still, he was overwhelmed by the sheer force of his love for her, by the magnitude and ferocity of it.

He would never get tired of loving her.

At that, the little _something_ that had been nagging at the back of his brain for the entire night resurfaced. It was in the way Murphy had said, “So, you two are next, huh?” In the way Raven had nudged him and wiggled her eyebrows. In the way Octavia had promised, “I don’t want you to keep putting this off because of me. I want you to be happy.”

And because Clarke knew him better than anyone, she could hear the staccato of his heart, could feel the slight tense of his muscles, and know something was wrong.

She pulled back to look at him. “What’s up?”

Licking his lips and inhaling a steadying breath, Bellamy twirled a piece of her hair around his finger. They had danced around this conversation dozens of times, and each she had prepared a response, had avoided giving him an answer like he was a tax collector. First it was: _we’re too young, we should live a little first._ Then it was: _I want to focus on my career right now._ Then: _Octavia needs us._

Only once, drunk and crying, had she ever admitted that she was just terrified.

“Hey,” she whispered, tilting up on her toes to knock her nose against his. “You okay?”

Bellamy sighed. “Just… Murphy and Emori tonight, seeing them, talking about their engagement stuff… it just…” Pausing, he drew in a breath. “I feel like maybe we should talk about –”

“ _God_ , Bell, not this again,” Clarke groaned. She dropped her forehead against his chest.

Quietly, he responded, “We keep putting it off, and we’re almost thirty. I want to talk about this.” His fingers toyed with her hair, his spare hand rubbing soothing circles on her waist. He was confident that if he could just ease the fear, a bit – if he could remind her that they were not her parents, that he was not her exes – that she would see his side. That she would say yes.

With a huff, Clarke looked up at him. Her eyes were deadly serious, cold as steel, blue as the base of a flame. “Now is not the time for this conversation,” she said firmly. She peeled herself away from him, walking the short distance to the couch and collapsing on it.

He knew, even in that moment, that he should let it go. That it was late, that she was tipsy, that they were careening down a dangerous path.

Instead, he asked, “When _is_ the time, then, Clarke?” She looked at him with her mouth slightly unhinged, and then gritted her teeth as she stood up. “We’ve been together for _nine years_! At what point do we get to move forward? Do we get to take that next step?”

She crossed her arms over her chest and glared at him. Bellamy felt heat bubble beneath his veins, angry and uncontrollable. “So, what, is being with me just _not enough_ anymore?” she retorted.

Letting out a breath of irritation, he ran a hand over his face. “That’s obviously not what I’m saying.”

“Isn’t it?” she challenged. He could tell she was getting worked up, could see the fury barely contained just behind her eyes. Every muscle in his body was screaming at him to _stop_ , to _end it_ , but he just tensed further. “You’re telling me that it’s time to move forward, it’s time to do this and that. And what if I’m not ready? What if I’m _never_ ready?”

Bellamy let out a sarcastic laugh. “Oh, _come on,_ Clarke –”

“I’m serious!” She threw her hands in the air. Inhaling deeply, her tone softened. “I have a lot of _shit_ , Bell. My parents got divorced, and it was ugly and messy. People _hurt_ me.” Her voice cracked, and it shattered a sliver of his heart.

The distance between them felt cavernous. Gently, he asked, “What do you need, Clarke? What do you need from me?” He took one step towards her, watched her clenched fists shake, her lip tremble. “I want this future with you, and I can’t do that if you’re always keeping me at arm’s length.”

In slow motion, he saw something flicker on her face, watched her school her features into something akin to ambivalence. She was looking at him as though he was a stranger, and it felt like a kick to the gut.

“Well, maybe you should find someone else, then,” she said stonily.

Bellamy scoffed, staring at her as though she had lost her mind. Clarke merely crossed her arms, unmoving.

He knew what she was doing; that she was _trying_ to push him away, trying to prove to herself that she was right not to trust him. Half of him wanted to let it go, to tangle their limbs together and pretend this hadn’t happened, to give her that peace she obviously needed.

The other half, though, was _exhausted_. Tired of jumping through her hoops, of unraveling the traps she’d set around her heart. He wanted all of her, not just the crumbs she left for him.

He took the bait.

“Maybe I should,” he responded evenly.

For a beat, neither of them seemed to breathe. Even as the words had left his mouth, he hadn’t _meant_ them, had been certain this wasn’t the end of them. This was just an argument, one that would be resolved in no time; they would crawl into her bed together and hold each other tightly, forgetting this had even transpired. But her expression was an odd mix of hurt and brokenness and relief, and anguish settled in his bones.

As the silence stretched on, he felt his chest constricting.

Bellamy realized, painfully, that he didn’t know how to lose her.

Across the room, Clarke sniffled. Dumbly, he saw her lips begin to quake, but he was rooted to this spot by the kitchen, incapable of even lifting his feet up to go to her.

In a ruined whisper, she said, “I think you should go.”

He lifted his eyes to meet hers, and he felt utterly wrecked by the torment he found there. Clarke bit her lip, held herself a bit tighter. The words he wanted to say felt too heavy, too menacing, to even utter; even as he opened his mouth, he knew nothing would come out.

Shattered, he left.

* * *

She only stops walking when she realizes she doesn’t recognize the buildings surrounding her.

Halting abruptly, Clarke stands still and tries to catch her breath. Her heart is ricocheting around her chest, and she wonders, vaguely, if she would even know if she is having a stroke. Pedestrians bump into her from every direction, tossing her irritated glances as she takes up space in the center of the sidewalk, so she shifts to lean against the cool brick of one of the neighboring buildings.

“ _Fuck_ ,” she mutters.

In a city of more than eight _million_ people, what are the chances? She has never been fond of statistics, but even she has to guess the odds are slim to none. And yet, there he had stood before her, making her throat close up as though no time had passed at all.

She rubs the bridge of her nose, tries to steady her breathing. In tried-and-true Griffin style, she begins the process of rationalization: people see their exes all of the time. It’s only been six months; it’s okay to still feel a little raw.

_He was the person you thought you could change for,_ a little voice mocks, and she shoves it way down deep.

The weaker, sorer part of her brain regrets not saying anything. Over the last six months, she has played dozens of different conversations in her head: where she doesn’t say those fateful words, where she apologizes, where she goes to his apartment the next morning, where they have makeup sex on the kitchen floor.

It’s that same part of her brain that reminds her how little closure they received, how abrupt it all ended. He never returned for his things in her apartment, nor she for hers; there was no final hug, no kiss, no last whispered _I love you_.

Nine years, tossed down the drain like rainwater.

It feels almost like karma, she thinks. Like the universe had decided they needed that one final moment together.

Instead of satiation, all she wants is more.

Shaking her head, Clarke jostles herself out of her reverie. She checks her watch and breathes a sigh of relief, realizing she still has nearly a half an hour before her shift starts. As she spots a taxi dropping another passenger off, she hastily moves towards it, climbing in the back before anyone else can slide in.

“Sixth and fifty-third,” she tells the driver, who simply nods and turns into the bustling traffic.

She closes her eyes as the car moves, letting her mind wander to the way he’d looked standing there in that coffee shop. His hair has gotten longer, she had noticed, and he’s let the beard grow in a bit more – it’s a look that suits him. She dreams about that perfect world, where she had swallowed her pride and walked up to him, where she’d let him wrap his arms around her again.

It’s a nice fantasy, she thinks.

With her head leaning against the window, she feels the impact before she ever sees the bus.

* * *

When he gets to the law firm, Bellamy locks himself in his office without a word.

The presentation today is _important_ , more important than whatever feelings of nostalgia and wistfulness are clogging his system right now. It’s for a high profile client, the kind of case that Bellamy had become a lawyer _for_ , and it had taken all of his bargaining power to convince Kane, Pike, and Jaha that he deserved to be made lead. This presentation had taken months to perfect, and he needs to prove himself today.

Inhaling deeply and rubbing the bridge of his nose, he tries to steady himself. It’s been six months, for God’s sake. He doesn’t think it should still hurt this much, feel this visceral. Yet here he sits, heart rate skyrocketing and brain so muddled he isn’t sure he can even _stand_ in front of the partners today.

His assistant knocks on his door, and he jumps up to unlock it. “The meeting starts in five,” she reminds him perkily, giving him a thumbs up for good luck.

“Thanks, Mel,” he murmurs. Grabbing his notes off his desk, he makes his way to the conference room, fiddling with the papers and setting up the projector as people begin to file in.

Kane sits at the head of the table, with Pike and Jaha flanking him on either side. Bellamy can feel the nervousness rooting itself in his system as they begin to shake. The painful twinge in his chest, which had started the moment he’d locked eyes with Clarke’s, twists a bit deeper.

The room falls into a hush, and he clears his throat. “So, I want to get started by walking you through our eight-point plan of attack,” he starts, flipping the slide with the remote in his hand.

As he opens his mouth, his phone rings.

The other two partners slightly tense, but Kane merely lifts an eyebrow, waiting for Bellamy to make his move. Glancing down at the caller ID, he frowns when he doesn’t recognize the number. Just as he goes to turn the phone off, something like intuition settles in his bones.

“Blake,” Pike says firmly.

Bellamy grabs the phone and starts to make his way out the door, murmuring, “I’ll be right back.”

“Don’t bother,” Kane replies flippantly. “Jackson? You’re up.”

Clenching his fists tightly to keep from punching something, he barges out of the conference room, ire filling his voice when he answers the call. “Hello?”

“Is this Bellamy Blake?” a woman’s voice, light and impersonal, asks.

Frustration and anticipation pool in his veins, and he begins pacing in front of the conference room, ignoring the dull murmur of conversation just behind the frosted glass as Jackson gives _his_ presentation. “Yes, this is he. And who is this?”

“This is Monroe at NYU Langone Health Center.”

His blood runs cold, and he thinks he might pass out. With a shuddering breath, he halts in place. Idly, he wonders if this is what a heart attack feels like. The only thought running through his mind is _Octavia._

In an instant, he is sprinting down the hall to his office and frantically grabbing his coat and keys. Mel gawks at him, pestering him with confused questions, and he waves her off as he moves to the elevator. “Is Octavia okay? Is she –”

The woman on the other line interrupts, “No, sir, I’m sorry. The patient’s name is Clarke Griffin. You’re listed as her emergency contact.”

At that, Bellamy’s body stills. He remembers the conversation clear as day, the warmth that had flooded his system when she had asked, nervous, _Is it okay if I put you down? You’re… the only family I have left, really._

That was nearly five years ago, now. It feels like an eternity.

The elevator arrives and he steps in, more disoriented now than he was moments ago. This morning was the first time he has even _seen_ her in the last six months, and now here he stands, about to meet her at her bedside in the fucking _hospital_.

His mind immediately returns to Octavia, to that night she had called him in hysterics, saying something about _Lincoln_ and _rain_ and _accident._ He isn’t sure he can take it, watching Clarke slip away from the world. In a panicked voice, he asks, “Is she okay?”

“She will be, we think,” Monroe responds. Bellamy’s entire body relaxes. “She just got out of surgery, and we wanted to make sure someone was here when she woke up.”

His taxi is already speeding down the road.

* * *

The first thing Clarke notices is the brightness of the light around her.

The second is the blinding pain she feels throughout her entire body.

She blinks slowly, clenching her eyes shut again when the fluorescent lights make her head hurt. There is a soft beeping surrounding her and something warm and solid enclosed in her right hand. Gripping it for balance, she groans in an effort to sit up.

“Hey, hey, easy,” a quiet voice murmurs. She feels another hand grip her arm in support, lifting her as she shifts into a more comfortable seated position. Eyelids fluttering, the face comes into focus slowly, and at first she thinks she’s hallucinating.

Clarke reaches her left hand up shakily, fingers grazing his bearded chin. He instinctually leans into her touch, offering her that soft smile of his, and she feels the tears well in her eyes. “Are… are you r-really here?” she whispers. Everything around her is hazy, and she really thinks she might be dead.

But then Bellamy laughs, a vibrant, hearty thing, and she snaps into reality in an instant. “Yeah,” he says softly. “I’m really here.”

Before she can stop herself, she blurts, “What the fuck?”

He barks out another laugh, one that sounds a little relieved, if she’s honest with herself. As he sits back in the chair beside her bed, she just stares at him, unabashed and wholly in shock.

Bellamy inhales deeply, and says, “You, uh… you were in a car accident. The nurse said a bus hit your taxi.” Something hitches in his voice, and Clarke feels a pang in her chest, one much deeper than the achiness in her bones.

“For what it’s worth, she said you should be okay. You have a concussion and had some internal bleeding, but they repaired it, so…” He trails off, eyes lifting to hers. She searches his face, still gaping at him. There are lines of worry denting his forehead, and she absently reaches out to soften them with her fingers, feeling a hint of relief when he actually seems to relax.

It feels so utterly ridiculous, the two of them sitting here in this hospital room. Just this morning, she sprinted away from him, unprepared for the rush of emotions she felt after seeing him for the first time in six months. And now here they are, fingers entangled, and he is looking at her in a way that feels all too familiar.

Softly, she asks, “What… w-what are _you_ doing here?”

At that, Bellamy drops his gaze as his thumb tenderly rubs her palm. “I’m… I’m still your emergency contact,” he responds almost nervously.

Clarke lets her head fall into her free hand. “ _Shit_.” If she was someone who believed in God, she would have felt relieved in that moment, grateful for proof that someone was spinning wheels to place her back in Bellamy’s orbit again. Instead, though, she almost wants to laugh at the absurdity of it all.

She can feel Bellamy’s eyes on her, and idly wonders if maybe she’s the one not willing to let him go.

Sighing heavily, she looks back up at him. “I’m sorry,” she whispers brokenly. He stares at her with his mouth slightly open, and she hopes he understands, hopes he can hear all of the words she hasn’t said: _for this morning, for that night, for not being brave enough to take it back, for not believing in us._

“Me too,” he replies. She hears: _for pushing you, for not understanding, for not staying._ He continues, “I didn’t… I didn’t know, then, that you could love someone beyond their capacity to receive it.”

She tightens her hold on his hand, shakes her head. “It wasn’t your fault,” she says decisively. There is a tremble in her voice when she adds, “How do you tell someone you might be too damaged to be loved?”

It is his turn to shake his head. Bellamy tilts her chin to look at him and cups her cheek in his palm. “You’re not.”

With a tearful laugh, she allows herself to fall into his touch. And it’s those eyes, brimming with forgiveness and love and so willing to take away all her hurt, that encourage her to lean forward and press her lips against his.

Mouths centimeters apart and inhaling each other’s air, she asks, “Would you take me back?”

His fingers weave into her hair, holding her steady. He whispers, “I never really let you go.”


End file.
